Studying for NCLEX PN! Need help!

[Aestolano]

Hello! Well I just finished nursing school & using the 5th edition Saunders to prepare for the NCLEX. I like it because it's simple & informative and it gave me a study calendar based on weaknesses. The study calendar gives me about 2 - 3 chapters a day, which seems easy. My problem is when I study, I take notes, too much notes. Since wording on Saunders is fairly simple already, I don't reword it anymore so I'm essentially copying it. Now, I'm studying the Maternity area, one of my biggest weaknesses. Because I struggled with it during nursing school, I copy pretty much everything on the book, causing my studying to be tedious & slow, taking up the whole day that I barely get to do the book's accompanying practice questions. My question is should I stop taking notes & maybe just read the book while highlighting & annotating stuff and doing more practice questions? Would that be enough to help me remember?

[Shawnpea]

Hi Aestolano,

I just passed the NCLEX-PN. I was doing the same thing you were doing, copying but I stopped. The information is already there. Think about the time you are wasting copying. You more than likely could have read the information several times versus copying it. Just read and try to understand what you are reading. It's ok to jot some things down but not the entire book. As for maternity, be sure to know what happens in each stage of labor. Peds, I would say know what happens in each stage of development. The fact that you are reading 2-3 chapters a day is great! I took the test and honestly felt like my nursing school questions were harder than the NCLEX. On the day of the exam just be prepared and take your time answering each question. You will do fine!